Facebook is to use footage from police body cameras to train its content moderation programmes in response to claims that it failed to prevent images of the New Zealand mosque shootings spreading across its platform earlier this year.
Images captured by the cameras will then be used to train artificial intelligence (AI) powered content moderation systems to more quickly identify and remove first-person footage of real-life shooting incidents, the FT adds.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The agreement is the latest move by Facebook to limit extreme content on its platform. In May, the company employed a “one-strike policy”, where users sharing violent content - such as a statement from an extremist group “without context” - would be blocked from using Facebook Live, says Sky News.
Why Facebook was criticised for its handling of the New Zealand shootings
On 15 March, 51 people were killed when a “lone attacker opened fire during Friday prayers” at two mosques in Chirstchurch, The Sun says.
The gunman live-streamed the attack for 17 minutes through Facebook, where the footage remained for a further 12 minutes before being taken down, says Sky News. Some 200 people watched the stream live, though 1.5 million videos of the attack were uploaded and subsequently removed.
Facebook was criticised for failing to identify the stream and for leaving footage of the attack on its platform “weeks” after the event, according to Engadget.
How police footage could prevent future violent live-streams
In its defence, Facebook said in a statement that its moderation algorithms “did not have enough content depicting first-person footage of violent events to effectively train our machine learning technology.
“That’s why we’re working with government and law enforcement officials in the US and UK to obtain camera footage from their firearms training programs – providing a valuable source of data to train our systems.”
The Met Police’s assistant commissioner for specialist operations, Neil Basu, believes that Facebook’s cameras may also benefit police “in their response to such incidents”, The Daily Telegraph reports.
The footage recorded by the Met will also be distributed through the Home Office to other tech firms developing software aimed at identifying mass shootings broadcast on social media, the newspaper adds.
-
The Icelandic women’s strike 50 years onIn The Spotlight The nation is ‘still no paradise’ for women, say campaigners
-
Mall World: why are people dreaming about a shopping centre?Under The Radar Thousands of strangers are dreaming about the same thing and no one sure why
-
Why scientists are attempting nuclear fusionThe Explainer Harnessing the reaction that powers the stars could offer a potentially unlimited source of carbon-free energy, and the race is hotting up
-
Trump allies reportedly poised to buy TikTokSpeed Read Under the deal, U.S. companies would own about 80% of the company
-
What an all-bot social network tells us about social mediaUnder The Radar The experiment's findings 'didn't speak well of us'
-
Broken brains: The social price of digital lifeFeature A new study shows that smartphones and streaming services may be fueling a sharp decline in responsibility and reliability in adults
-
Supreme Court allows social media age check lawSpeed Read The court refused to intervene in a decision that affirmed a Mississippi law requiring social media users to verify their ages
-
What's Linda Yaccarino's legacy? And what's next for X?Today's Big Question An 'uncertain future' in the age of TikTok
-
Social media: How 'content' replaced friendshipFeature Facebook has shifted from connecting with friends to competing with entertainment companies
-
Meta on trial: What will become of Mark Zuckerberg's social media empire?Today's Big Question Despite the CEO's attempt to ingratiate himself with Trump, Meta is on trial, accused by the U.S. government of breaking antitrust law
-
What does an ex-executive's new memoir reveal about Meta's free speech pivot?Today's Big Question 'Careless People' says Facebook was ready to do China censorship
